If thou art merry, praise the Lord with singing, with music, with dancing, and with a prayer of praise and thanksgiving.
If thou art sorrowful, call on the Lord thy God with supplication, that your souls may be joyful.
D&C 136:28-29

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Monday, August 29, 2011

I should totally post another blog entry. I have sooo not been in the mood lately. But today I am feeling it. School is back in session. It brings with it scheduling challenges and new things to try. Thanks to the "unexpected cello" we adopted this summer, Bobo is now in orchestra. Not to fear, she is still in band (and jazz band). Apparently the change we made to her schedule triggered an unexpected enrollment in choir as well. How cool is that? She is attempting the trifecta this year!

Naji, my fourth grader, has enrolled in early morning orchestra. He's talked me into observing the class for the last two days. 35 fourth graders have committed themselves to learning music at 6:50 every morning. What a great way to start the day. I love seeing how they respond to the conductor and sit up straight. They are working on open strings and pizzacato right now. And they sound surprisingly good. Naji is still on a full-size viola, but the 15-inch viola I bought him is a little too large, so the school is lending him a 14-inch viola. He is so over-the-moon about being old enough to study music that he is insisting that he also be allowed to take early morning choir. Starting next week, he will go straight from orchestra to choir, thereby having two classes under his belt before the school day even starts.

JoJo has been accepted into the music program at Dixie State College. He is majoring in clarinet, but he will be playing tenor sax in the jazz band, alto sax in the pep band, and flute in the flute choir. He is also taking sight singing and class piano.

I have to say I love to hear my kids practice -- and there has been alot of that going on these last couple of weeks, but hearing them practice the piano -- now that is heaven here on earth.

And last but not least, the old lady band finally came out of their month long hiatus and had a practice in Leeds last night. Yeah, we've still got it -- just like riding a bike.

This morning I noticed a tagline on one of the blogs I read. It says "Music self-played is happiness self-made." I concur.